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Import and local polyolefin prices in Indonesia have witnessed a new round of increases this week, with sellers attributing the uptrend to strong crude oil futures along with expectations of an improvement in demand ahead of the Ramadan month...

Although there were several bearish factors pushing players to hold softer expectations, a major Taiwanese producer’s decision to cut its April PVC prices to China and India sharply caught most Asian players by surprise...

In the Middle East, March PE offers from the regional suppliers emerged with rollovers to increases amid higher energy and upstream costs. However, rising costs have failed filter through the March prices in African PE markets, where prices remained stable or decreased from February...

In China and Southeast Asia, import PS prices have maintained their stable to slightly firmer trend which has been mostly in place since the markets hit a more than one-year low in around early December...

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In China’s polymer market, where imports hit an all-time high, Saudi Arabia increased its share last year to become the top supplier for the first time since 2001 when ChemOrbis began keeping records, according to the data from ChemOrbis Import Statistics.

The data reveal that China’s total polymer imports from Saudi Arabia in 2017 climbed by around 29% from a year earlier to be reported slightly above 3 million tons, suggesting a record high level. Overall imports from South Korea were also up by 2.5% last year but South Korea lost its position to Saudi Arabia to become the second largest supplier after standing at the top for more than 15 years.

China imported almost 19.3 million tons of polymers in 2017 to hit a record high, with Saudi Arabia constituting 15.6% of overall imports. Saudi Arabia has gradually increased its market share over the years as it formed 13.6% of China’s total imports in 2015 and 13.7% in 2016.

The largest contribution to Saudi Arabia’s record-high market share in 2017 came from HDPE, which posted a yearly increase of 35.7% to reach almost 1.4 million tons. Meanwhile, China’s total HDPE imports were reported at around 6.4 million tons. The data also show that Saudi Arabia overtook Iran as the top HDPE supplier in 2017 after four consecutive years.

A similar case was seen in the LLDPE market where Saudi Arabia became the largest supplier to China in 2017 for the first time since 2013 by overtaking Singapore. China’s LLDPE imports from the country surged by 43.5% on the year to reach around 755,000 tons.

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